Wal-Mart to Offer Health Benefits to Domestic Partners Next Year and 2 Other Dow Movers to Watch

Wal-Mart announced Tuesday it will offer health insurance benefits to domestic partners of its American employees beginning in 2014. The colossal retailer will also offer vision care to its eligible employees and their dependents, said information the retailer sent to employees this week.

Wal-Mart spokesman David Tovar said that, ”Since we operate in all 50 states, we thought it was important to develop a single definition for all Wal-Mart associates in the U.S,” Explaining that employees’ domestic partners may be covered if they are legal spouses, not legally separated — or a domestic partner of same or opposite gender in an ongoing, exclusive relationship that is similar to marriage for a minimum of 12 months with the intention to continue sharing a household indefinitely.

Diet Coke announces that it will debut a new, limited-edition T-shirt available exclusively in Target stores. The new T-shirt is the design that won the second season of the Diet Coke Young Designer Challenge, and is part of the brand’s iconic “Stay Extraordinary” platform.

The competition asked creative individuals to create an original T-shirt design inspired by the “extraordinary style” of Taylor Swift and the people who enjoy Diet Coke daily. Hundreds of designs were received from across the United States from aspiring designers searching for the ultimate career boost — to see their design on Target store shelves.

Johnson & Johnson said on Tuesday that the business chiefs of its three Chinese units will report to one chairman there starting in September in an effort to grow sales in that country. The diversified healthcare company announced that the worldwide chairman of the consumer business Jesse Wu will become chairman of J&J China and report to J&J Chairman and Chief Executive Alex Gorsky.

Prior to this, the three Chinese operations have reported to separate business heads in the United States. This shakeup comes at a time when pharmaceutical firms are being scrutinized there after the Chinese government began looking into bribery accusations against the United Kingdom drugmaker GlaxoSmithKline.